Tag Archives: Maud Gonne

I love them for a variety of reasons: they inspire, they entertain, they challenge, they leave me in awed silence, they provoke, or, most importantly, they were “there” in my most formative years, and held out a torch to lead … Continue reading →

Maud Gonne, Irish revolutionary, feminist, radical, and lifelong poetic muse of William Butler Yeats, was born on December 20 in 1865. She married John MacBride (after a couple of notorious affairs and illegitimate children). John MacBride was an Irish nationalist … Continue reading →

Maud Gonne, Irish revolutionary, feminist, radical, and lifelong poetic muse of William Butler Yeats, was born on this day in history in 1865. She married John MacBride (after a couple of notorious affairs and illegitimate children). John MacBride was an … Continue reading →

Daily Book Excerpt: Memoirs: Next book on the Memoir/Letters/Journals shelf is The Gonne-Yeats Letters 1893-1938. I’ve written much about these two, two of the leading lights of the Irish Renaissance of the early 20th century, although they had different concerns … Continue reading →

I love this Smart Set column by Jessa Crispin on magical thinking. Ostensibly two book reviews, the piece starts and ends with a discussion of the “mystical marriage” of W.B. Yeats and Maud Gonne (“It is to be a bond … Continue reading →

Maud Gonne, Irish revolutionary, feminist, radical, and lifelong poetic muse of William Butler Yeats, was born on this day in history in 1865. She married John MacBride (after a couple of notorious affairs and illegitimate children). John MacBride was an … Continue reading →

A letter from Maud Gonne to WB Yeats, in December 1908. Yeats had come to visit Gonne where she was living in Paris. After years and years of friendship (not to mention what they called their “spiritual marriage”), it is … Continue reading →

I love books where entire worlds open up in the footnotes. I have often followed the trail of footnotes and found books that have become ultimate favorites of all time, because of the mention in a footnote. The footnotes to … Continue reading →

Ella Young wrote in her autobiography Flowering Dusk of her glimpses of Maud Gonne and WB Yeats: I see her standing with WB Yeats, the poet, in front of Whistler’s Miss Alexander in the Dublin gallery where some pictures by … Continue reading →

— There is only one four-way intersection on the island. No stoplights. The intersection is referred to one and all as “The Four Corners.” “Excuse me, can you tell me where the bank is?” “The Four Corners.” “Got it.” — … Continue reading →